


Dream a Dream

by Shujinkakusama



Series: Dream a Dream [1]
Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, Gen, Implied/Referenced Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-06
Updated: 2016-01-11
Packaged: 2018-04-30 09:06:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 18,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5158109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shujinkakusama/pseuds/Shujinkakusama
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Crystal Gems go on missions like this all the time. They just never go this catastrophically wrong. How long can Pearl wait before she breaks? / Lots of war-era references, canon divergence, set sometime before Catch and Release. OC villain.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Slippery Slope

**Author's Note:**

> General Moldavite's Specials pop up in most of my work, but this fic does diverge from Unbroken Ties' timeline. But if you're interested in the baddies, they've been talked about over there.
> 
> I'm experimenting with format here, sorry for the dust! Because the scenes are short, I'll be posting more than one in a 'chapter'. 
> 
> Tektite is formed after meteorite impact. So is Moldavite. Tektite is known as the telepathy stone, and supposedly increases psychic ability.

It should have been a simple mission. Retrieving artifacts was as simple as their work got—logic puzzles, guardian beasts, traps and dungeons—came as naturally as breathing after the thousands of years the Crystal Gems (sans Steven) had dedicated to that very purpose. The youngest had proven quite capable as long as his organic half was kept safe, and when the other Gems could not guarantee that personally, he had his bubble to protect him, and more recently, the ability to summon Rose’s shield at will. Accounting for the perfectly likely possibility that a puzzle would slow them down, the subterranean sanctuary should have taken half a day, at most.

 

The first setback came when they had gotten separated. Pearl could emit light from her Gem more effectively than the others, and Garnet could see quite well in low light, but Amethyst and Steven didn’t have those advantages. They were lucky enough to fall down the same trapdoor, but finding their way back—finding their way _anywhere_ —was proving almost impossible. It felt like hours before the maze gave way to anything but more darkness.

 

The second setback came from finding Garnet, winded and battered, but having bubbled several lesser Gem beasts; spiders, judging from the webbing that clung to her face and visor. She had managed to locate a chunk of wood, which soon provided light enough to guide the others by. The spiders’ webs burned slowly, wound tightly around the makeshift torch and cast an eerie blue light on the walls around them. The three carried on, with Amethyst offering Steven distractions from his worries, while Garnet used her future vision to guide them toward their objective.

 

The third setback came an hour later, when they still couldn’t find Pearl—but heard her unmistakable shriek deep in the catacombs. Garnet dropped the torch, and Amethyst was lucky enough to catch it without burning her hands on the enchanted flame. Steven narrowly avoided it landing in his hair, ducking behind the Fusion instinctively.

 

“Garnet? Was that—“

 

“ _Amethyst_! Stay with Steven!” Garnet hissed, taking off at a run, gauntlets at the ready. She could barely see, heart and mind gripped with icy panic she couldn’t shake, but her third eye guided her as she skidded around corners, catching and ripping out chunks of wall to guide the others along behind her. Sorting out the ‘what ifs’ before they could become full visions was a skill she’d mastered, something she knew how to do after long years of dealing with worst case scenarios that cropped up in quick succession in the heat of battle, regardless of how realistic they were.

 

Right now, that scream could have meant anything.

 

Garnet hadn’t been this afraid in a very long time.

 

The maze of corridors didn’t last, and as Garnet punched her way through the last marbled door, she felt her entire body go colder than she’d ever dreamed.

 

Pearl was suspended in midair; limp and lifeless, as if held up by unseen strings, with her eyes and mouth half open. Her Gem glowed, the blue light tinted a discomfiting shade of bile green, and Garnet screamed her name to no effect. Above her glowed what looked like a black iron lantern, newer than the structure they were in, but dangling from twisted chains attached by spikes to the ceiling.

 

The room was foggy; the dim light and hazy air spoke of a lack of airflow, and perhaps an old flame, somewhere, and Garnet paid it no heed. She dove for Pearl, caught the slighter Gem in her arms out of the air, and landed hard enough that her feet broke into the stone tiles beneath her.

 

“Pearl, wake up!” Garnet shouted, and it echoed off the walls. Her gauntlets spanned Pearl’s entire torso and most of her legs, but their bigness was what kept her teammate’s head from lolling back. Pearl was effectively dead weight, a puppet cut off, and her blank eyes didn’t seem to register that Garnet’s face was inches from hers. “ _Pearl_!”

 

* * *

 

 

When Pearl came to, it was not in Garnet’s arms, and neither was it in the sanctuary they had been exploring. She felt foggy; dizzy and heavy, the way Steven described feeling when he’d been sick, once, with what turned out to be a nasty head cold and a high fever—neither of which full Gems could experience naturally. She was immune to Earth’s diseases and bacteria, the way all her kind were, but that knowledge didn’t make her vision swim any less as she tried to take stock of her surroundings.

 

The light was dim, and her Gem throbbed in protest as she tried to get a little more light to see by. She tried to reach up, only to find that her arms were bound apart, spread wide and with heavy manacles encircling most of her hands and wrists. By contrast, her legs were spread apart by a bar, also shackled; Pearl couldn’t move anything but her head, and she felt so heavy, so tired...

 

Panic bubbled up inside her, but Pearl felt disconnected somehow, like panic was the right response, but someone else was experiencing it. This was a dungeon, one she didn’t recognize, but that must have belonged to the enemy. They were at war, after all, and who else would chain her arms and legs and leave her in a room that smelled of spices and smoke but the enemy? She wondered distantly if there were magic on the air, too; the tingle was there, but it was impossible to tell if that came from the uncomfortable angles her limbs were being forced into or if it were a spell.

 

She hoped the others were okay.

 

Her memories may have been jumbled, but she remembered some of the mission that lead to… wherever this was. Steven would be safe with the others, she hoped. Amethyst was stronger than her physically, so she may not have been caught at all, and Garnet…

 

Garnet was an unstoppable force; Pearl didn’t need future vision of her own to know that the Fusion would come for her. She always had. This battle would be no different, no matter who or what the enemy was.

 

Pearl didn’t know how long she closed her eyes, but her eyelids felt weighed down by several tons of lead. The grating sound of steel against stone drew her attention, had her forcing her eyes open and head up to squint against the sudden onslaught of light from the doorway. The room was smaller than she realized—though perhaps cell was a better term—and as her eyes adjusted, she tried to make out features of the silhouette in the doorway. Tall and curvy, but with long wavy hair styled to the side, loose pants that let light through to reveal legs far less muscular than Garnet’s. The green lantern she carried barely illuminated her features, but Pearl could make out a sharp nose and an inordinate amount of jewelry.

 

The enemy. Pearl had never seen a pitch black Gem like her before, not on the battlefield. She seemed to absorb even the light of her lantern, eerie and monstrous. The only color came from her jewelry, shining sinfully in the green lantern light. But the only one of Homeworld’s Generals that kept such trinkets was General Moldavite, and her Specials wore the same shards of fallen Gems with twisted pride. Useful even in death, they claimed, and the thought made Pearl’s stomach twist.

 

Her heart stopped, then began trip hammering inside her chest as who she presumed must have been her captor let the door swing shut behind her with another awful screech. And then, just as suddenly, the Gem skipped toward her, light like a dancer, with a bounce in her step that made the bracelets and trinkets jingle and sing with her every move. This was sick. This was wrong.

 

And suddenly, the other Gem was eye-to-eye with her, and Pearl found that she barely had the strength to lean her head back, but the wall kept her from getting far. The other Gem closed the distance she’d gained, close enough that Pearl could feel heat and smell the heady scent of incense coming from her.

 

“Hello dolly,” the enemy crooned, smiling too big for her face, her white teeth a sharp contrast against the near coal color of her skin. “I’m Tektite… your new sculptor.”


	2. A Dire Consequence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pearl's situation only gets worse with time.

 

Tektite of General Moldavite’s Specials.

 

Pearl didn’t think she had ever been more afraid of another Gem, face-to-face. It was nothing but luck that had spared her from run-ins with the Homeworld General’s elite team in the distant past, but she knew their names. General Moldavite had been granted free reign on the battlefield and used it to shatter countless Gems on both sides, to turn them into trinkets and war trophies—or worse, mounted whole on shields and clubs, to be broken in direct combat against their own. Pearl had never been a coward, had placed herself before Gems much stronger and larger than she was countless times, but she had also never been stupid; she knew better than to be anywhere near one of the Specials. She knew even Rose Quartz herself couldn’t bring her back if one of Moldavite’s agents got hold of her Gem.

 

And here she was, bound, lost, and staring her death eye-to-eye.

 

Her first thought was of Steven—that the boy absolutely must not fall into the bejeweled hands that had found their way to her face and hair. Tektite was playing with her, but it gave her time to think. Her next thought was of Amethyst, because for all her brute strength she was sure to be shattered for her mouth if any of the Specials got their hands on her. Steven’s healing powers still didn’t work, for reasons unknown, and they didn’t have Rose to save them, and—

 

 _Garnet_.

 

Garnet could take her captor easily.

 

Pearl remembered to breathe, but barely, as sharpened nails hooked into the collar of her tunic. Garnet was far stronger than the rest of them, and surely she would be able to use her future sight to get here in time. Or at the very least, to keep Steven and Amethyst out of harm’s way.

 

“How garish!” Tektite decided finally, and with strength befitting a monster, she tore away Pearl’s top as if it were flimsy as paper. Pearl yelped, pulled at her bonds to no effect, and Tektite unwound her sash from her waist to finish the job. “What an ugly combination. A pretty little thing like you, wearing blue and yellow... Awful. It should be pink.”

 

“H-hey!” Pearl’s voice was smaller than she would have liked it to be, but she knew Tektite could hear it, even if her protest went completely ignored. The other Gem hummed to herself, tugging at the remaining fabric until it fell away, jerking Pearl forward and back as she worked.

 

Tektite was methodical, even as she tore away Pearl’s socks and divested her of her slippers. Everything had to go. Too quickly, Pearl was stripped completely, and all that remained of her outfit was the sash wrapped loosely around Tektite’s narrow shoulders like a scarf. When she was finished, the enemy stepped back to admire her handiwork, and Pearl felt a brilliant flush of embarrassment rise in her cheeks at her newfound predicament; arms and legs spread, completely barred for the enemy to do... really, anything. Pearl was afraid to think of the possibilities.

 

“Much better,” Tektite decided, turning away and making her way to the door.

 

“What?” Pearl blurt out, staring wide-eyed at her retreating back. “He-hey! Come back! You can’t just leave!”

 

Tektite heard; she stopped at the door, paused, and turned to look back down at her captive, still smiling her too-big, eerie smile. “ _Silly thing_. Dolls don’t talk,” she said, pulling the door open with ease and skipping out with a merry jingle. It swung shut behind her, leaving Pearl completely alone in velvety darkness.

 

* * *

 

 

Time meant nothing in the dungeons. Pearl tried in vain to pass the time, unable to move, breathing heavy air and the strange heady scent of incense—or whatever it was that made the air taste like metal on her tongue. She couldn’t move her arms; couldn’t much feel them, either. Her legs were no different. At some point the strain of having them spread wide had faded into a dull ache that had finally stopped mattering.

 

Meditation was almost impossible, but Garnet had taught her long ago, and those teachings came in handy while she tried not to lose herself to the absolute silence of her cell. Tektite hadn’t come back in who knew how long; Pearl knew that time in this kind of place could be an illusion, could be twisted by magic or boredom or both, and she had no way to keep track. It felt like days; it could have been hours.

 

From the lack of feeling in her fingers, which was slowly spreading down to her palms and arms, it was probably the latter.

 

Hours. Hours during which anything could’ve happened to the others. Pearl scarcely dared to think of what might happen if Steven were captured—they still didn’t know if he could retreat to his Gem, had no way of knowing what would happen to his organic body if the Gem itself were damaged, there was no way _to_ find out without risking Steven’s safety. And if any of Moldavite’s Specials were given the opportunity to tamper with _the_ Rose Quartz’s Gem…

 

Pearl wished she could dry the tears that poured down her cheeks at the very idea. She couldn’t protect Steven like this, couldn’t even get herself out of her bonds—what if he were caught? What if he got _hurt_?

 

General Moldavite couldn’t find out about him, she decided, eyes clenched shut against the darkness all around her. No amount of torture or threats against her own safety; she’d protect Steven with her life, just as she’d protected Rose Quartz. Even knowing there was no coming back if she were shattered here.

 

When the door screeched open, Pearl nearly jumped, eyes snapping open. Tektite had finally returned, with a tray of something Pearl couldn’t quite make out with the sudden burst of blinding light from outside—wherever outside led. Somewhere other than this dank cell, and to Pearl’s horror, she realized that ‘somewhere’ could have been off world, on another Gem-controlled planet, on a ship bound for Homeworld. There was just no telling.

 

“Poppet!” Tektite said excitedly, all smiles and chimes as she bounded over. The tray was covered with an array of jewelry that made Pearl’s stomach drop out; chips of shattered Gems—friend and foe alike, no doubt—were sewn to a wide leather collar, beaded bracelets and earrings, strung on metal wire, small polished rounds that had once been someone’s Gem, sandstone and fluorite inlaid in gold and bronze rings, a chain with drops of tourmaline and tanzanite, larger hunks of citrine and calsilica interspersed and expertly drilled through to be sure that no part of their original being remained… and Pearl was certain that if she looked much longer, she would gag. She shut her eyes against Tektite’s smile, opting to ignore her presence.

 

For her trouble, the enemy slammed the back of her fist across her cheek.

 

Pearl bit her tongue, hard, to keep from crying out, but met her eyes in an act of defiance that she knew she’d regret. For the first time, Tektite had stopped smiling.

 

“Now look at you,” she pursed her lips, grabbing her captive’s face to inspect the swelling her own blow had left behind. Her hands were rough and calloused, and Pearl had the distinct feeling that her hands could shatter Gems, despite her wispy appearance. “I can’t work with an uncooperative subject. You’ll just have to wait longer.”

 

But she didn’t leave, not immediately, and Pearl wished she would. Instead, she kept hold of the Crystal Gem’s face, holding it in place, forcing Pearl’s gaze toward the opposite wall as she fastened a loop of that bejeweled chain around her midsection. Pearl’s stomach churned, but she had nowhere to pull away _to_ , much less the strength to do it.

 

Tektite had taken to muttering to herself, something about needing more white, that selenite or moonstone might work, or maybe larimar for some blue, and Pearl swallowed hard against the urge to cry; she’d known Gems by those names, knew their faces, and worse yet, she remembered losing them in the battle for Earth. That they hadn’t been given a proper burial, that the Specials might have had them destroyed…

 

“There’s a good dolly,” Tektite purred, and to her horror, Pearl realized that she had indeed started crying again. But her captor smoothed her hair, finally releasing her face, and whispered praises that only made things worse. Pearl tried in vain to stop crying as Tektite placed a diadem around the crown of her head, fastening it tight around her Gem so that the accursed thing stayed perfectly in place, just barely cutting into her forehead. “You look much better like that. Just like that. Go and cry, you’ll need it out of your system before I give you to the General.”


	3. Split Focus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the others catch up to Garnet, and Pearl receives some devastating news.

Nothing yet had worked.

 

Garnet’s thoughts were racing; equal parts angry and terrified. She could see no way to rouse Pearl, and neither could she guess what had happened. Beyond the heady scent on the stale air of the room, there was nothing here, no enemy, no triggered trap, nothing that sang with danger. The lantern glowed ominously above, but there were similar lanterns in many of the rooms she’d been in, lit with magic and nothing more.

 

Pearl offered no resistance when she was shaken, when Garnet gently cradled her head and neck in one gauntlet. She breathed so shallowly that Garnet only caught it by getting close enough for it to fog her visor, but had no strength, no tension in her limbs, as if she could fall apart at any moment.

 

“Pearl _wake up…_!” Garnet tried again, desperation edging into her normally tightly controlled voice. She clutched the smaller Gem to her bodily, carefully keeping her slack limbs supported. Shaking hadn’t worked, and she was afraid to squeeze her too tightly, lest she poof into her Gem. Garnet wasn’t sure if that would help or hurt the situation; at least as she was now, Pearl was… somewhat with them. That comfort only helped a little.

 

Amethyst and Steven arrived in what had to have been mere minutes, but for all the futures Garnet had scanned, all the scenarios she had explored, it felt like hours. Garnet hurriedly forced her expression into something neutral, something that masked her fear.

 

“Garnet, is Pearl okay?” Steven asked immediately, panting a little as Amethyst set him down. He’d run as much as he could before the dust from Garnet’s rampage in the corridors had interfered with his breathing. The Gem had been happy to pick up the slack, shapeshifting slightly to grant herself a little extra distance to each stride.

 

Garnet froze, turning sharply where she sat. “She’s breathing. But not conscious,” she said mechanically, and her fear briefly turned to Steven’s safety in this place. But the boy had his shield; had his bubble, too, and perhaps being organic would keep him from harm. The probability of anything happening to him was far lower than that of Pearl’s situation growing more dire. Steven should be safe. The Fusion could breathe a little more easily, and exhaled stale air trapped too long in her lungs.

 

“What the heck is that?” Amethyst asked, pointing up toward the glowing green lantern mounted on the ceiling. She wrinkled her nose, lip curling in distaste. “This room smells like…”

 

Amethyst didn’t finish; her violet eyes glazed over before rolling back in her head, and she wobbled as her knees buckled.

 

“Amethyst!” Steven cried out, darting forward to support her as she fell to the floor. Her Gem, too, glowed a faint green—not as brightly as Pearl’s, but it was on the rise, getting stronger, more vivid.

 

Behind the safety of her visor, where her expression could not be seen, Garnet’s eyes went wider than she thought they ever had. “Steven, bubble! _Now_!” she hissed, blinking away an onslaught of visions that threatened to overtake her; Amethyst collapsing like Pearl, never to wake again… of Steven being next. She couldn’t begin to guess why she wasn’t affected, or why it hadn’t hit _yet_ , but Steven’s reaction was immediate, and Amethyst’s form hovered only inches above the floor before settling against the side of the pink bubble.

 

“Garnet, what’s happening?” Steven asked, panic plain in his voice as he hugged Amethyst to him. The purple Gem sagged heavily in his arms, just as Pearl had in Garnet’s, and he toppled backwards under her deadweight.

 

Garnet’s answer felt like ash on her tongue even before she said it, and she licked dry lips, having long forsaken breathing in this wretched tomb. Uncertainty was a feeling she rarely suffered, especially in front of Steven, but lying outright was out of the question.

 

“I’m… not sure. Hold on and don’t let your guard down.”

 

Steven nodded obediently, confusion writ across his features. He had never seen Garnet like this; didn’t think she knew he could see the trembling in her hands. But it was hard to miss.

 

Amethyst murmured something unintelligible into her own shoulder, and Steven leaned in to listen. “She said something…” he said, looking up at the ceiling uncertainly. The light looked eerily orange through the safety of his bubble. Amethyst's speech hadn’t been garbled, not like when her Gem had been cracked, but Steven still couldn’t make it out—and then Amethyst was silent, breathing quickly going shallow until he could scarcely feel it at all. “Amethyst? Amethyst!”

 

* * *

 

 

Her captor’s visits were growing more and more frequent.

 

Pearl’s mind was slipping away from her as the hours—days?—passed. She thought often of Garnet, of the only hope she had at being rescued. Sometimes, she couldn’t quite recall Steven’s face, couldn’t remember Amethyst’s features clearly, either, but other times she could. It scared her how jumbled her thoughts were, the way she alternated between remembering Beach City as if she’d been there only days prior and remembered the strawberry battlefields, fighting for Rose Quartz, looking for Garnet—sometimes finding her split apart, with Ruby or Sapphire alone, waiting for the other to reform—after every skirmish. Garnet was her constant, the one person she still had, the one _face_ she could still see vividly in her mind’s eye.

 

She had to hold on to hope that Garnet would come for her.

 

Pearl had long lost feeling in both arms and legs, and that almost made it less humiliating, having Tektite draping things all over her. The other Gem would _tut_ and _tsk_ and treat her prisoner like a mannequin, tugging her arms and legs. During one of her visits, she’d dressed her in some gauzy affair, tied the leather collar with too many fallen Gems’ pieces tight around her neck so that it hurt to breathe. Another time, she came with earrings and a sharp pin, relishing in the pitiful fight the Crystal Gem tried to put up when it came to giving her earrings decorated with polished topaz and chips too small to identify. Tektite pulled her hair, complained about its length, and insulted her in the same breath that she praised her compliance.

 

What she did not do, for all her poking and prodding and incessant merriness, was give Pearl any straight answers. More than that, she ignored almost everything she said in favor of listening to her own voice, sometimes speaking _for_ Pearl, as if she really were a doll.

 

The treatment was working. Pearl was quickly losing herself.

 

And when Tektite did finally look her in the eye, with her eerie smile and too-bright eyes, and asked who she belonged to, where her loyalties lay, Pearl was not immediately sure how to answer.

 

Hesitation was exactly what Tektite had been waiting for; as a reward, she unlatched the spreader bar that kept Pearl’s legs apart and had her lowered to the ground where she could sit, if nothing else, for the first time in longer than she could remember. “Much better,” Tektite cooed, and Pearl couldn’t do much more than curl her toes in discomfort as feeling slowly tried to return to her limbs. Tektite unlatched her iron shackles from the wall, instead fastening them to hooks in the ground. “Now we’re getting somewhere, my pet.”

 

That sparked something in Pearl, stirred a memory she’d long forgotten. She wasn’t a pet, and she didn’t belong to anyone. Certainly not now, with Rose Quartz…

 

Gone?

 

But she survived the war, Pearl remembered. Or thought she did. Everything was so jumbled; she had to close her eyes to block out the green light from the cast iron lantern Tektite always carried with her, trying in vain to think straight. “The Earth,” she whispered finally, more to herself than Tektite. “I’m a Crystal Gem… I protect the Earth.”

 

 _Steven’s_ Earth.

 

The Earth Amethyst had been made on; that Rose Quartz loved so fiercely.

 

The planet she and Garnet had met on and fought for, fought their own kind, fought monsters made from other Gems—the planet she refused to call home, despite having spent most of her long life on it.

 

“I would not say such things if I were you,” Tektite said, and her voice had changed to a low growl. Pearl flinched at the hardness in it; at the way Tektite grabbed her by her shoulders to force her to meet her eyes. “Now listen to me, poppet. General Moldavite won’t have any of that. You’ll do exactly as I say if you want to stay whole and alive.”

 

Pearl swallowed hard, but nodded obediently, at least as much as the heavy collar around her neck would allow. It would do no good to be killed before Garnet could come for her.

 

And like that, Tektite’s interest was gone, and she swept up her supplies, her lantern, and was back to the stairs. She glided weightlessly, and Pearl watched her, dreading both the shut of the heavy metal door and the next time it would be opened. The enemy paused with a dark hand on the latch, then turned, raising her lantern high. Her smile glinted, twisted and monstrous, and she spoke.

 

“By the way, poppet… It seems two little ones are on their way to me now,” she purred, and Pearl’s eyes widened painfully. Icy claws gripped her stomach, turned it inside out, and she opened her mouth to protest. Tektite continued, uninterested. “I hope they’ll be as entertaining as you are… two of a kind, hm? Should be fun.”

 

Pearl’s first horrified thought was that she might mean Steven and Amethyst; that somehow they’d been found and overpowered. And then, worse, that she may have meant Ruby and Sapphire; that Garnet somehow had been bested in a fight, separated again. That all hope was lost.

 

“Oh poppet, you look _so_ lovely when you cry,” Tektite said, finally pulling the door open with a gut-wrenching screech of metal on stone. “I really do hope they’re at least half as entertaining as you’ve been. I don’t know what I’ll do to them if they aren’t.”


	4. Sands of Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time is an illusion. Pearl just can't seem to keep track of it.

There was nothing Pearl could do from her cell. That sickening knowledge had been easier to stomach when she couldn’t move at all, but once feeling had returned to her extremities (which _hurt_ , all the way to her toes and fingertips), all she could think of was escape. She tugged at her bonds, twisted her hands uselessly inside the cuffs until her wrists were raw and stinging. Her legs were free, but Pearl knew that would do her no good. The shackles at her wrists tightened when she pulled, and that spoke of magic aiding their size—which meant nothing short of cutting her own arm off would work to escape without the key.

 

She wished she could.

 

She wished she had that strength.

 

Looking down at the heavily beaded dress she’d been forced into, at the fitted jewelry around her thighs and biceps, Pearl knew that she had no chance on her own. She wasn’t very strong physically, and mentally…

 

The world still rocked when she looked around, still felt like she was deep under the sea. Drowning might have been easier than losing her mind, she thought distantly, wondering only moments apart about Steven’s safety and the status of factions long lost in battle. She didn’t know which memories were false, and it drove her that much more mad. Who was waiting for her in the world outside this cell? Steven or Rose Quartz? Amethyst, or one of the other younger Gems she’d fought alongside? Had there ever been a small Amethyst on their side at all, and had the war ever finished?

 

Where did the dream begin and end, Pearl wondered, but she couldn’t say for sure. Her memory was filled with holes, gaps and tears and millennia missing, jumbled like puzzle pieces strewn across the floor.

 

Garnet was waiting, she told herself, blinking against tears that seemed to have no end. No matter what was true, whether she’d transcended time or was lost somewhere between life outside of Beach City and the war that never left her, that she could neither clearly remember nor fully forget, Garnet was constant. Garnet existed in all realities, in her dreams and nightmares. If anything was real, any _one_ , it was her. The Fusion was her anchor, her rock, her tie to hope now—wherever she was.

 

It was hard to imagine now that Garnet would still come for her, with innumerable months since she’d been here. It could have been years. But the two captured had to be Steven and Amethyst, and nothing on Earth could save Tektite or General Moldavite’s Specials if they laid a hand on the boy. (Would he have been a man by now? Pearl couldn’t imagine missing out on decades of Steven’s short life, but it was possible.)

 

Garnet fought for Steven the way she fought for Rose, only better. More successfully. She was stronger in every way that mattered, now, and even if she were far away and couldn’t hear her…

 

Pearl acknowledged goddesses, but had never really prayed to them. She put her faith in Gems, in the infallible Rose Quartz, in beings she could see for herself. Still, through her tears, she wanted to reach out, she wanted to be heard. Even knowing it was impossible, she spoke to the air, spoke to the cell around her, and hoped that anyone but Tektite could hear her.

 

“Garnet…” Pearl whispered, feeling her voice rattle around a sob in her throat. She drew her knees up, buried her face in the soft fabric of the dress she wore, and balled her fists. “Garnet, please… Please save them. Please, Garnet. I-I don’t care if I rot here, I don’t care what happens to me, just… Even if I never see you again, _please_ …”

 

It was a lie, and Pearl knew it even as she spoke it aloud. More than anything else in the world, right now, she wanted to see Garnet’s face, to take even a drop of her strength for herself. Garnet would never be so weak as to be captured to begin with. But she knew that wish was selfish, and she hated the part of herself that was weak enough to think it.

 

In a world without Rose Quartz, Garnet was everything she had left.

 

Right now, she didn’t even have Garnet.

 

And Garnet was different from Rose, different in so many ways. She took Garnet’s constant vigilance for granted, took her strength and warmth and caring as if it would never fade.

 

She had never told her. Never put Garnet’s importance into words, never thought there would be a need. But faced with the very real possibility of never seeing her dearest friend again, the urge to tell her, to turn back time and confess feelings she had scarcely allowed herself to admit in the past few millennia…

 

Pearl’s tears turned hot on her cheeks, choking sobs rattling her small frame. The jewelry Tektite had adorned her with jingled with her trembling; broken Gems sang a sad song for the Gem wearing their pieces, and Pearl murmured Garnet’s name over and over until she’d cried herself out.

 

* * *

 

 

Something was different the next time Tektite appeared, and for the life of her Pearl couldn’t gauge how long it had been between visits this time. In the darkness of her cell there were no markers, no seasons or cosmic events to mark the weeks or years by. There was only Tektite, and she visited sparsely, sometimes leaving her alone for what felt like decades. Pearl had learned to anticipate her captor’s bubbly façade, readied herself for her true nature to reveal itself at a moment’s notice, but that moment where she wasn’t alone in the dark was something she craved. The enemy was volatile and prone to wild mood swings that Pearl had triggered a few times, but she learned to keep her captor happy with her, even while she was on eggshells at all times. Pearl didn’t expect Tektite to come in and slam the door with such force that the hinges rattled and screeched, or to walk so briskly that there was no rhythm to the music her jewelry tried to make.

 

Pearl was afraid, but wondered if it meant that Tektite had gotten news from the front—hopefully in her favor, though it would do her no good now. With luck, someone might find her Gem in a condition they could resurrect her from with Rose’s Fountain. Not that she ever heard how the war was going. Dolls weren’t meant for ugly things like battle.

 

Steven’s face was a far-off memory now, one that sometimes flickered like a candle’s flame before dying.

 

Tektite said nothing as she placed a new array of tools on the floor before her—ground pigment and a bowl of liquid, probably water. Pearl knew without having to ask that the powders had been Gems once, and she thanked her stars that she had cried enough earlier to stave off tears now. Fine features contorted in anger, Tektite turned to Pearl and grabbed her face roughly, and although she didn’t want to, Pearl pushed down the urge to jerk away, let herself be drawn in close.

 

The inspection was meaningless, but Pearl still felt some degree of humiliation as Tektite opened her mouth for her to check her teeth—still perfect, she didn’t _eat_ —and winced when the still-fresh earrings were twisted in their holes, guaranteeing a permanent mark even though they’d long since healed. Tektite’s glower did not waver, even as she made a noise of satisfaction. She kept going, tugging Pearl’s hair.

 

“Grow it,” she demanded, and Pearl knew not to argue. She closed her eyes, willed what little strength she had into shifting her hair so that it fell past her shoulders. Tektite tugged again. “Longer!”

 

And Pearl complied, even though doing so made the ground feel like it would buckle beneath her. She didn’t have the strength for this; had trouble shapeshifting to begin with. Finally, with her hair tickling her knees where she sat, she stopped. Her Gem glowed so dully that it barely lit up at all, and even if she’d wanted to, she couldn’t grow another inch. Her bangs she kept, along with the fringe that framed her cheeks, and Tektite clicked her tongue in approval. At least that was the right decision. Rough fingers smoothed their way through wavy locks that were now caught in the beads and swirled hunks of her gold diadem, and for the first time, Tektite removed it.

 

“I’m going to paint you,” Tektite said, low voice rough as she tugged the trinket free of Pearl’s long hair, taking several strawberry strands with it. Pearl looked up at her, startled, and Tektite stared blankly back as she continued to speak. “You’re not to move, poppet. If I like my work, we’ll make it permanent. Do you understand, my doll?”

 

Her captive hesitated. Permanent either meant mustering up magic she didn’t have, or that Tektite had even more spells at her disposal than Pearl knew about. She didn’t want to find out more. But she whispered an affirmative.

 

“So I can hear you,” Tektite hissed.

 

“Yes,” Pearl said again, voice rough from crying… sometime. She never could remember how long it had been between bouts of despair, only that it never left her system. No one was coming for her now. “I understand.”

 

“With respect, this time,” her captor growled, tugging her hair sharply. Pearl cried out, and Tektite tugged again, twisting silken strands around her fingers for an extra sting.

 

Pearl cringed, swallowed the woolen feeling in her throat, and pushed down the abrupt urge to spit in the other Gem’s face. Some ember of pride lingered in her broken heart, and the request had it burning brightly for the first time in forever. But it died quickly, and she answered the way she knew her captor would want; “Yes… Madame Tektite.”

 

And like magic, Tektite was all smiles again, completely transformed in her green lantern light. She praised her captive, and Pearl sighed inwardly, relieved, only for Tektite to tug her upward slightly, hands hooked under her arms, arranging her to sit with her knees folded and her arms still spread by the chains. Deft hands pushed her too-long hair back over her shoulders, out of the way. Long fingers drew deliberately along the fringe of her collar to make the Gem chips clink together in time to the bangles around Tektite’s wrist, and the dark Gem laughed like it was the sweetest thing she’d ever heard. Pearl’s stomach knotted, but she said nothing.

 

“Now close your eyes, and don’t you move,” Tektite instructed her, brushing her fingers through her hair, tucking loose strands behind her ears. Her touch—when she wanted it to be—was almost loving, affectionate and soft and sickening, and Pearl hated that she preferred it to isolation. So at her request, she closed her eyes and waited with baited breath.

 

The first stroke of a brush against her eyelid made Pearl tense, but she was careful not to show it. Tektite praised her once more, dusting ground Gem and shell along her eyelid. This was lapis lazuli, she told her, mixed with aquamarine, and both names felt like a sword through Pearl’s heart. The blue would compliment her hair, Tektite told her, sweeping her brush upward. She was so hard to choose the right pigments for, but she’d picked just the right ones, her poppet would see.

 

It was everything Pearl could do to stay still, to endure hearing names that were too familiar that had been ground to dust, that were being applied to her skin. Cinnabar lipstick was applied, then wiped away to be replaced with something else, with an explanation that Pearl was simply too light for bright colors. Pink was the key, Tektite had said multiple times, and she lamented having no rhodochrosite to apply to her cheeks.

 

And suddenly, without warning, the reed of the brush Tektite used snapped—and with it the strenuous peace between them.

 

“Horrid!” Tektite hissed, and she threw the offending instrument aside. Pearl opened her eyes just barely, in time to see Tektite reach for the bowl of water before the whole thing was upended on her face. Her eyes burned as the color ran into them, and Tektite stormed out.

 

The door screeched shut, and Pearl sat in the dark for a very long time before she dared to breathe, and when she did, she dissolved into tears.

 

Who knew how long she’d have to wait this time? 


	5. Breaking Point

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Garnet finds another teammate in hot water, while Pearl gets pushed to the breaking point.

Amethyst was dead weight against Steven’s shoulder, and the boy looked around wildly. The lack of an enemy, of anyone to fight, to pinpoint a cause for the purple Gem’s abrupt loss of consciousness was frightening. He hugged Amethyst close, keeping his bubble up despite the lack of a visible opponent, and looked around their barren surroundings. Still, the only thing that drew his eye was the cast iron lantern on the ceiling, and Steven wasn’t sure whether that meant something, or if it was the lack of anywhere else _to_ look. The walls were otherwise barren, with a few empty torch stands, and no markings, no carvings to speak of. His gaze drifted downward instead, to his companions, not far away but functionally out of reach with his bubble between them.

 

Garnet hadn’t let Pearl go, hadn’t so much as loosened her gauntlets’ grip on the smaller Gem’s listless body, but she was looking around too, lips pursed in a frown that betrayed more concern than Steven thought she realized. Her visor obscured most of her face, as usual, but Steven could read her from the nose down. Garnet always put on a brave face for him, and Steven wished she didn’t need to—but right now, more than that, he wished Amethyst and Pearl would come back to them.

 

It seemed his wish was granted, though only by half half; Amethyst abruptly started coughing, as though she’d been deprived of air while she’d been out; she jerked forward with eyes wide open, automatically gripping Steven’s arm for support without thinking.

 

“Amethyst!” Steven exclaimed, hugging her tightly enough to crush the air from her lungs. “You’re okay!”

 

“Steven?” Amethyst wheezed, sounding lost, but gripped him back, glad for the physical reassurance that this was reality, rather than what she’d seen moments prior. “Y… yeah, man, I’m good. No sweat.”

 

There were no words in the English language that could express Garnet’s relief when Amethyst stirred in Steven’s arms, but that relief was cut short by a knot of worry about Pearl’s lack of response. Amethyst had been unconscious for less than a minute and sounded shaken, but otherwise fine; Pearl, though…

 

Sometimes her shallow breathing quickened and hitched, but it was something Garnet could scarcely feel against her skin, against her collar where Pearl’s face rested. She still seemed completely cut off, lost on another plane of reality, with her shell left here to wait for her. Her pale skin seemed to be that much more ghostly in the dull green light of the room, and she was chilled, clammy—and everything about that wasn’t right, didn’t make sense.

 

Garnet didn’t want to acknowledge that the feeling in her stomach was terror—fear was long behind her—but it was clear that whatever spell Pearl was under, it hadn’t grabbed Amethyst the same way. They were dealing with two very different beasts.

 

“Amethyst!” Garnet shouted, “Can you get up? We’re getting out of here,” her voice brooked no argument, and though disoriented, the purple Gem nodded.

 

“I’m good!” she shot back, trying to get her bearings. The world wobbled, and she looked down, trying to take stock of herself. Her Gem shone, a faint green light ebbing from the center, no brighter than a firefly’s glow, and Steven opened his mouth to comment on it as it faded.

 

“What was—“ he started, eyes wide and round, and with as little warning as the others had been given, they rolled back into his head.

 

“ _Steven_!”

 

The boy wobbled, tried to shake it off, and Amethyst’s arm darted around his middle to support him; his Gem glowed, first pink, then the same faint green from before. He couldn’t keep his eyes open, couldn’t stay upright, and barely heard Garnet and Amethyst calling his name as he fell, quartz bubble crashing down with him.

 

“Amethyst, we’ve got to get them out of here; then tell me what you saw,” Garnet said, panic plain in her voice now, and Amethyst didn’t need to be told twice.

 

She shouldered Steven easily, nodding toward the way they’d come in. “Let’s ditch this place, G!” she shouted back, starting off at a run. Garnet wasn’t far behind, Pearl cradled gently against her breastplate.

 

Behind their retreating backs, the mounted lantern’s green glow flashed triumphantly.

 

Two to go.

 

* * *

 

 

Tektite was furious.

 

One prisoner had slipped from her fingers, and the other… she dared not approach the pink quartz. Not yet. Not without orders from General Moldavite. Which left her back with the pearl, who was more and more complacent with each visit. This time, she had tormented her prisoner by painting her Gem directly and dousing her with water when she wanted to start again. Pearl had stopped fighting her, giving in to the routine without much more resistance; she could change her jewelry, change her hair, and mold her like clay in her hands. She was as ready as she could ever need her to be, ready for that final push to descend into darkness…

 

And none of the other Specials were responding to the signal.

 

None of her teammates were waiting to take the prisoner to the next step.

 

Tektite could divorce that feeling from her work. The pearl was a lovely subject, beautiful and delicate and easy enough to work with; she would have liked to keep her for herself, but knew that Moldavite was unlikely to give her up. She’d worked tirelessly on making the perfect offering—all that remained was to lift the spell, and that had to be done from the outside.

 

This was unacceptable.

 

Tektite breathed heavily through her nostrils, tossing aside her brush to get a look at her handiwork. The design she’d painted on her captive’s Gem was perfect, finally, and that was always a clue that her work was done… or had been.

 

Time meant nothing to Tektite. She lived in a space between dream and reality, in the subconscious of as many victims at once as Moldavite willed. Hundreds of years had passed in the pearl’s mind, but the first quartz—an amethyst, for _some_ unfathomable reason—had only stayed a few minutes. The emersion hadn’t worked.

 

_“What the—woah, kinky dungeon setting,” her captive had said, tugging once at her cuffs before effortlessly breaking away from the wall. Tektite had watched from the doorway, safe on the other side, as the amethyst divested herself of her bonds without a second thought. Magic was only so useful against someone whose subconscious wasn’t susceptible._

_The amethyst looked around, not bothered by the darkness one bit. And then, to Tektite’s outrage, her would-be captive had the audacity to yawn._

_“Nope, not feeling this,” the runt declared, and Tektite wondered if she could see her peeking in through the gap in the door. She doubted it; but purple eyes scanned her way, and the white-haired Gem shrugged. “I’m ready to wake up now, this dream’s trashy.”_

_When nothing happened, Tektite considered—briefly—the possibility of victory. But that thought was dashed on jagged rocks when her would-be captive shifted into some strange form—bigger, broader shouldered, more_ appropriate _for an amethyst—and let out a bone-chilling roar, plowing through the dreamscape as if it were made of nothing more than gossamer._

 

It had never _not_ worked.

 

Tektite worried her lip, bit so hard she could taste copper—what a funny thing to be aware of, she thought—and looked up to see her proper prisoner watching her with haunted eyes, still obediently chained in her dungeon. At least this one behaved. She couldn’t fail with the pearl.

 

“Madame?” Pearl’s voice was a soft whisper that tumbled shakily from lips stained with mixed pigment.

 

Green eyes shot up to meet hers, and Tektite breathed the heady scent of her victory as the once proud Crystal Gem looked away. Pearl was afraid, and she should be; she could torment her for hundreds of years to come, but there was little point.

 

“Speak, poppet,” Tektite said smoothly, and she smiled her menacing grin, inviting her forward with a hand in her hair. Soft, coaxing strokes brought Pearl’s face forward, and she looked up at her captor again.

 

“You said… there were others?” Pearl’s voice was small, and Tektite’s smile dropped instantly. “Two others… I remember. Were they…” she trailed off, shoulders shaking, too uncertain to continue.

 

Tektite could see, faintly, the image of two Gems in Pearl’s mind. She remembered them; the two that fused, that Pearl thought so often of. A ruby and sapphire. But that memory rippled, replaced with two new forms, and one was that accursed amethyst from earlier. The other was at once massive and small, two images that bled into each other, impossible to bring into focus.

 

“Miserable wretches,” Tektite said dismissively, a practiced response. She knew how to finish the pearl off, and perhaps she should; she’d fallen so far down the hole that General Moldavite might have no use for her. Maybe that was why she was still dreaming. The darker Gem cradled Pearl’s cheek in her palm, gripped her jaw enough to keep her looking forward. “Oh, my sweet, favorite little doll… nothing has been as fun as you. They couldn’t hold a candle.”

 

“Couldn’t?” Pearl’s eyes went wide, and Tektite’s smile was back again, toothy and monstrous.

 

“Not at all, not when you’ve been so… malleable,” she crooned, leaning in close. “I’ll tell you a little secret, pet… I started on you last.”

 

The choked gasp Pearl made was just what Tektite wanted to hear, music to her bejeweled ears, and she trailed a hand down the slight Gem’s arm, draped in thin cotton heavily beaded with pieces of lost souls, bicep almost completely covered in bracelets with similar remains of Gems set in gold and brass. Her hand settled on the thick shackle that covered hand and forearm almost to the elbow. “Here’s a little gift… from me to you,” Tektite said, snapping her fingers—and like that, the chains and shackles dissipated, and Pearl fell forward, narrowly catching herself on her arms.

 

It was the first time in centuries that Pearl had seen her hands and wrists, and set in golden slave cuffs were a matched pair of cracked Gems; one red and one blue, missing some slivers here and there, but undoubtedly broken beyond repair.

 

Ruby and Sapphire’s Gems.

 

“No…”

 

Pearl’s breathy whisper made Tektite laugh, and she let her captive sit back in shock, staring at the inlaid stones in her bracelets.

 

“You didn’t really think anyone was coming to save you, did you?” Tektite clicked her tongue, shaking her head in mock-sympathy. “Such a pity… You poor thing, holding out hope for so lo—”

 

“No, _no, NO!_ ” Pearl screamed, and Tektite felt a ripple in the dream, felt herself get pushed back. That wasn’t the plan. The pocket reality was unstable like this, and Tektite rose, making a hasty escape to the stairs. Fortunately for her, Pearl seemed to close in on herself; dissolving into a mess of tears and trembling sobs rather than breaking through the way the amethyst had earlier.

 

She almost felt something—guilt?—at the way her pet captive fell apart, but Tektite’s face was impassive as she watched Pearl throw herself on the ground, screaming another Gem’s name— _Garnet_? Tektite had never met one of those—and she shook her head, slipping out the door with her green lantern in hand. She would be useful later, or she would spend eternity wrapped up in her loss; either way, the general had one less enemy to worry about.

 

That just left the other one: the pink quartz.

 

Tektite considered waiting on her interrogation, on beginning anew, but thought better of it. There was no need; she didn’t need rest. She needed results.

 

That was the only thing that would appease General Moldavite.


	6. Illness Illusion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tektite confronts her remaining captive and gets more--and less--than she expected.

Something was definitely not right.

 

Most notably, the world’s colors were… wrong. Tektite’s dungeon was green and gray; mossy stones with dripping rust that had gone green with age, over black metal chains that should have been polished, but never had been. Unfinished and rough, like Tektite herself was; craggy and sharp, but artfully arranged in the way that General Moldavite would have enjoyed if she ever came to watch. Her green lantern was a gift, blown glass made from fallen Gems, with an eerie way of glowing no matter how long it stayed lit. It was the only light she allowed; the proof of the general’s benevolence, and a reminder that her captives belonged to a new master now, one whose favor was everything.

 

It was about ambiance; the entire trap was, had always been, and no one—save that Amethyst upstart earlier—had ever been able to upset it at onset.

 

Tektite didn’t know when, or how, or if she were still rattled from the Pearl’s breakdown earlier; her grief had almost destroyed the illusion, almost trapped both of them in an endless empty void. Illusions were like dreams, and no one could truly die there, but they could be trapped. They could never wake up.

 

The game had changed.

 

“You!” Tektite hissed, stumbling back from the massive Gem before her; pink curls and a glowing white gown ruined everything about the fantasy, shone light where it shouldn’t have been. There were no shadows in the corners of the cell, no mystery left anywhere at all. There was just Tektite, dwarfed by the only Gem she might have feared more than General Moldavite.

 

The leader of the rebellion: Rose Quartz herself.

 

“I don’t know _how_ you broke this, but you’ll never escape,” Tektite hated her already. Hated her soft eyes and downturned rosy pink lips, hated that she stood with her hands clutched as if in prayer. No armor, no weapons—and no openings.

 

Rose Quartz was untouchable.

 

And Tektite was terrified.

 

“You rotten thing, you don’t know your place at all!” the darker Gem went on, stumbling back on shaking legs. “A Quartz! A filthy _soldier_ ,” she spat, but missed, and Rose Quartz’s sad eyes just stared down at her, unimpressed, unblinking. “You don’t deserve the trouble you’ve caused! The power your little uprising has is nothing, nothing compared to the Diamonds!”

 

And she rambled, screamed, and stared up with fearful eyes at the impassive face of an enemy she had only ever heard of, never seen directly, never had the misfortune or honor of being so close to. Rose Quartz made no move, made no response at all, only looked sad and holy and like she was made of light and compassion and a handful of other blasphemous things that Tektite wanted nothing to do with.

 

Much lower down, where the glow was brightest, Steven Quartz Universe sat, wide-eyed, trying to take in what he was hearing—and wondering why the image of the mother he had never known surrounded him where his bubble ended. Her giant dress covered him completely; she stood taller than his bubble, as if she were hiding him from the enemy with her bigness.

 

It was hard to be afraid, Steven realized, and he turned his attention to Tektite instead, watching and listening.

 

“How dare you start all this!? You wretch!” Tektite screeched, reaching to throw something—a hunk of stone, loose from the floor—and it flew neatly through Rose Quartz’s hair without so much as disrupting her image. “Answer me!”

 

“Um…” Steven started, and Rose’s image began to fade. He looked up, tried to memorize as much of his mother’s sad face as he could, but she vanished like smoke on the wind. “I’m… not Rose Quartz. I’m Steven.”

 

Tektite’s vision swam when she jerked her head down, staring wide-eyed at the little boy, smaller than she was by a fair amount, but so very much smaller than the behemoth she’d been looking at… That she’d expected.

 

“What?” her voice was sharp; her tongue clicked at the end of the word, clipped, confused and angry and _bitter_ that the enemy she hadn’t wanted to face had been ripped from her. “You’re…”

 

There was no question in her mind that she was looking at a human boy; or at the very least, not a Gem. Not a Quartz. But humans had no magic, and he was protected by a bubble that couldn’t possibly be anything else, even in this dream world.

 

Tektite could feel one eye twitching at the corner, and she shook her head. The chime of Gem shards helped calm her, helped bring her back to reason—it was funny, the way her old projects supported her even now. With renewed clarity, she looked closer, peered at the pink bubble the boy sat inside, and shook her head again, derisively this time. “Impossible. You changed your shape, Rose Quartz.”

 

“I’m _not_ my mom,” Steven protested, getting to his feet. Tektite stepped back, confused, and the boy paused for a moment. “I’m going to drop my bubble… and we can talk?” His voice was hopeful, but nervous—two things a filthy traitor like Rose Quartz would never have freely offered. Hackles up, Tektite nodded, but said nothing.

 

The bubble popped audibly, and to Tektite’s horror, the glow went nowhere; the dream space was still impossibly bright, and the light seemed to come from the small… child? The idea was one Tektite understood, but was still unfamiliar with. Children were useless to her, and Gems didn’t reproduce the way humans did. But he looked it, breathed like he needed the air, and moved in a way that betrayed him.

 

He wasn’t a Gem.

 

Tektite didn’t know what to do.


	7. Blinding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Garnet and Amethyst regroup while Steven tries to reason with Tektite.

The return to the surface took almost no time at all, though Amethyst had some trouble keeping up with Garnet. A quip lingered in her throat about it; that Garnet ran too fast with her long legs, to slow down and let the short Gems catch up, but with the urgency of the situation more and more apparent with Garnet’s reckless running, the words died before they could reach her lips.

 

Amethyst hadn’t experienced the thousand-year war. She sometimes envied Pearl’s energetic retellings, and wished her eyes had seen the things she’d heard a dozen times for herself. She had emerged from the Kindergarten too late and only had her companions’ stories to draw from; Pearl’s glorious melodramatic propaganda, and Garnet’s grim disagreement, her insistence of how terrible it had been.

 

It was clear now, from the feel of the dream alone, that Pearl had put on a show for her and—more recently, perhaps more importantly—for Steven. The war had to be glorious, had to be this amazing thing that they had been successful at, because otherwise…

 

She had known at once that she was dreaming; sleep was one of her favorite ways to pass time, and she indulged in it often enough that it was almost a hobby. Dreaming came naturally to the Earth-grown Gem. It hadn’t taken more than a few centuries to figure out how to manage her dreams, how to control them, how to manipulate the outcomes—usually for more laughs, more entertainment.

 

The trap hadn’t had much effect on her, save for leaving a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, and a coldness that hadn’t left her Gem until the green light was gone.

 

Pearl, though, who had next to no experience with sleep, and was prone to suggestion…

 

And _Steven_ …

 

Amethyst sprinted to keep Garnet’s stride, and Garnet paused only to fire a gauntlet through a dead-end, so quickly that Pearl’s unconscious form barely faltered in her arms. The purple Gem worried, easily clearing the hurdle Garnet stepped through to reach the outside.

 

They were visiting the Strawberry Field again, and this time, Amethyst couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable at the giant weapons peppered across the landscape. Fruit-bearing bushes had covered many, but not all of the weapons, but some still stood tall and eerie against the pink-hued sky.

 

“Where’s Lion?” Garnet asked, and Amethyst wondered if Garnet had forgotten about breathing for the duration of their mad dash. She crouched, letting Steven down gently, supporting his head and neck.

 

“Don’t know, G,” Amethyst huffed, turning her attention to Steven instead. “He’ll show up. Always when we don’t expect it, right?” She paused, not very much surprised by Garnet’s lack of response. “How’s Pearl?”

 

The Fusion looked down at the Gem in question. She didn’t have an answer, and not knowing was the worst feeling she had experienced in millennia. “The same. And Steven?”

 

“Asleep,” Amethyst said, earning what she knew must have been a critical look from behind Garnet’s visor. “I don’t know what else to call it, Garnet. He’s in a deep sleep.” She paused, pressing a hand to Steven’s chest, then pinching his nose shut. She was rewarded with the boy’s mouth opening to breathe, even if it was shallow, and she gestured to him. “See? Asleep. It’s a sleep spell.”

 

Garnet couldn’t afford the feeling of relief that tried to overwhelm her then. Steven sleeping was one thing, but Pearl was decidedly _not_ asleep—at least not in the way Amethyst slept, or that Steven might have been. “What did you see? When you were asleep.” She asked sharply, closing her third eye to new possibilities that didn’t make any more or less sense. Steven sleeping might mean he would wake on his own, which would take a few hours at most, but if not, his organic body might be at risk. Pearl’s body had no reason or way to wake itself, and the idea that the other Gem might sleep forever stirred something in her that tried to rip her apart in ways unfusing couldn’t.

 

She couldn’t lose Pearl. Pearl was integral to her life in ways the pale Gem didn’t know, couldn’t understand, and that Garnet never intended to tell her outright. Not when Pearl’s heart had so long belonged to Rose Quartz.

 

Now was the time for listening, however, and Amethyst relayed her experience dutifully. Sometime during this, Lion made his appearance and curled around Amethyst and Steven, betraying no sign of worry for his human or any of the other Crystal Gems.

 

Garnet hoped that was a good sign.

 

Amethyst hoped Lion would get his massive, strawberry-stained paw out of her hair.

 

* * *

 

 

They were at an impasse.

 

Tektite had no intention of opening up to this… this Steven’s attempts to interrogate her, and the little boy had no reason to fall into her clutches. At the same time, she had no reason _to_ exploit a human’s weaknesses to get information, to torture a member of one of the lesser species that lived on this miserable colony. The human might die, might break before she got anything of use—how resilient was this species to magic, again?—and then…

 

Then she might not be able to pull herself out of his dream, either, unless the other two Gems she’d sensed were within range. But so far, the ruby and sapphire had resisted her magic, hadn’t fallen prey to her incense in the room at all.

 

Something was keeping them from her clutches, and Tektite didn’t have to like it to accept it.

 

“So…” Steven tried again, “What’s your name? You’re a Gem, right?”

 

Tetktite pulled a face. “What else would I be?” she hissed, and the human looked like he seriously considered her quip before shrugging helplessly.

 

“I haven’t met many other Gems,” he admitted, crossing his legs and settling with his hands in his lap. Open. Honest. Vulnerable.

 

None of those were expressions Tektite would have used to describe an enemy, and perhaps he wasn’t. But Rose Quartz had her mark on him somehow, and that may have meant he would be useful… if she could figure out how to play right. No tricks, no magic—the idea was daunting. The game relied heavily on both.

 

“Your kind wouldn’t have,” she said, pausing briefly, then adding slowly, using all her willpower to keep the venom from her voice, “But you’ve met… Rose Quartz?”

 

Tektite saw the boy reach to settle a hand over his midsection, but didn’t know what to make of it. Steven shook his head. “It’s complicated,” he said quietly, “But I haven’t. Just in dreams.” He paused, “Is this a dream? It feels like being in mom’s room.”

 

Green eyes widened painfully, and Tektite set her jaw.

 

“That looks like a yes,” Steven said eagerly, looking around now. “I remember I fell asleep… Oh!” His eyes had found her lantern, and the child leaned forward. The Gem clutched its handle, drawing it away. “That’s the lamp from the ceiling! Are you… stuck in it?”

 

“What kind of question is that?” Tektite hissed, flexing her claws, ready to tear into the too-observant human—but she knew she couldn’t afford to, and she shook her head, jingling her jewelry. The tic beneath her eye calmed, but barely.

 

“I know a Gem who was stuck in a mirror once,” Steven explained uneasily, mentally preparing himself to summon his bubble if he needed it. “So I thought, maybe…”

 

“General Moldavite would _never_ do that to me!” Her low voice wavered. A memory tickled at the back of her consciousness, and Tektite ignored it, pushing it away in favor of anger. Anger was easy. “What would you know?”

 

“General?” Steven echoed, brow creased with confusion. “Are you… talking about the war mom was in?”

 

Tektite laughed, and it was deliberately exaggerated. It bounced off the walls, and she drew herself to her full height. “There won’t be a war much longer,” she bragged, showing her too-big grin off. “You won’t live to see the end, but we’re close to beating out those useless rebels. Rose Quartz’s army doesn’t stand a chance.”

 

For a long time, Steven said nothing, and Tektite took it as a victory. But then, in the room that seemed to glow pinker with each passing moment, she noticed—the human’s dark eyes were somber, concerned, and he looked like he might be trying to think of a delicate answer—one Tektite didn’t need, one that wasn’t appropriate. “What? What are you looking at me like that for?”

 

Like _her_. Like the image of the traitor had earlier. Suddenly, she could see Rose Quartz’s face in his again, round and soft and kind. Tektite didn’t want to see that. Didn’t want anything more to do with this dream.

 

“Um…” Steven started, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly. “The war’s been over… for a long time.”

 

“ _What_?!”

 

He cringed at the way her shriek echoed off the walls, worse than her laughter. “It’s been over—for thousands of years!” Steven explained, and without having to see her reach for it, he’d summoned his bubble again to deflect the stone Tektite lobbed at him. “You don’t know?”

 

Jaw slack and wide-eyed, it was abundantly obvious that Tektite didn’t know. She stared, simultaneously furious and horrified by the honesty in his voice. The child wasn’t lying. Tektite might not have the strength to root through his memories like this, not like she could with the pearl earlier, but she could smell a lie a league off.

 

He wasn’t lying, not about any of it.

 

And that little feather was back, that nudging memory, something that had struck too close to reality. Something that melted her magic, drew her out of her own dreams— _are you stuck in it_?

 

In the lantern, or in the illusion?

 

A flicker of General Moldavite in all her glory, sneering and displeased, with her lantern in hand—and then nothing, no sound, no more, no less. Life returned as normal. Tektite shook her head, and this time, the tinkling of her bangles did nothing.

 

It couldn’t be true, but even the feeling of doubt—doubting her memories, doubting her master, doubting her _reality_ —felt like a dozen knives in her back. Tektite screamed, and it was the sound of nightmares, a pitch no banshee could hit. Steven had to cover his ears, winced at the way the world rippled and shook. His bubble withstood the sound wave, but both he and it were pushed back away from the other Gem.

 

“I can help you!” Steven offered desperately, but he doubted the other Gem could hear him over her own voice. The walls trembled, started to come down in pieces. “If you’d let me—us—the Crystal Gems, we can help!”


	8. Burning Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tektite and Steven each try to get a proverbial leg up on the other. Only one can make it out alive.

_The Crystal Gems, we can help_!

 

Somewhere in the howling void that came through, and Tektite whirled on the boy, eyes alight with madness. “ _What do you know_?!” she screeched, voice raw and angry—and hurt, Steven realized, not that he could help that. Her chest heaved, breathing the scent of incense that was like lifeblood, and Tektite drew herself up to her full height.

 

Not much taller than the boy’s, now, as the unbalanced power in her dreamscape tipped in the enemy’s favor.

 

“You’re a trick—an illusion! You’re just that traitor Rose Quartz hiding somehow! You think I don’t know magic when it’s right in front of me?” She laughed, extending a clawed hand to point accusingly at the child, even as the walls continued to give way around them. “Don’t try to lie to me, Rose. You may have fooled others, you may fool even yourself, but humans don’t _have_ magic!” But the Gem knew that wasn’t quite right even as she said it, even as she screeched desperately and tried to rewrite their reality. That wasn’t the problem.

 

_It’s been over—for thousands of years!_

 

“I don’t know what makes you think I’m fool enough to fall for your lies,” Tektite raved, “And I don’t much care! We’ll win this war, and I’ll deliver you to the General in pieces _myself_!”

 

Stones crumbled around them, and Steven slowly stood up, still in his bubble. “I’m _not_ Rose Quartz!” he insisted, frustration visibly building. “Calm down and _talk_ to me! We don’t need to fight!”

 

He had her eyes.

 

The realization set fire to Tektite’s madness. Dark eyes and curly hair; Tektite could see her yet, with her bigness and soft, sad face. An _honest_ face, she thought, recalling how unguarded the little boy seemed only moments ago. Without that bubble, she could have him, she thought. “I’ll pull _Rose Quartz_ right out of you, child!”

 

Steven’s arm raised automatically, protecting his Gem, and Tektite got a glimpse of the pink stone peeking out beneath his shirt. But more than that, more importantly, she saw fear—raw, unprotected—in his eyes. She laughed.

 

“You don’t want that, Rose?” she mocked, stepping forward, swinging her lantern. The green light cast no farther than each stride she took, but in her wake was darkness, the way things should have been. The emptiness where walls no longer stood was a dull red, rusty and flat, and Tektite was certain she could still win this. Somehow. “I don’t know what you did to this human, but it doesn’t matter. If you’re in there, I’ll rip you to bits, just like that pearl!”

 

“You hurt _Pearl_?” Steven gasped, and he backed away somewhat, bubble rolling easily with him. The pink tint to the room went with him too; protected him, even though Tektite was walking briskly and cutting into the edges. “What did you do to Pearl?”

 

 _There._ Tektite had found the chink in the boy’s armor.

 

She smiled, saccharine oozing from her expression, and the hand that wasn’t firmly grasping her lantern’s handle settled easily on the swell of her hip. “I could show you,” Tektite cooed, leaning in. “I could break you down the same way… She was my greatest project; the finest clay I’ve ever sculpted from. Such a pity she fell apart in the end.”

 

“What does that mean?” Steven demanded, dark eyes wide and fearful as the enemy Gem pressed closer, finally raking her clawed nails down his bubble. It didn’t pop, but the scratches left behind were visible for long moments. Tektite didn’t answer. Instead, she drew with her claws, leaving streaks in their wake. Steven couldn’t read the writing, and that frustrated him further.

 

“Where’s Pearl? What did you do?!” he cried, frantically trying to maintain the concentration needed to keep his bubble intact despite his panic. “Tell me! Please!”

 

“No… I don’t think I will,” Tektite drawled, “You can’t get something for nothing.”

 

“Then what do you want?” Steven was desperate; the walls were still coming down around them, peeling away like raw bark now, with fresh hot pink beneath. The ground itself was cracking audibly, and Tektite seemed to stand on the only stretch of stone that was stable. Steven’s heart trip-hammered in his chest. “Just tell me what happened to Pearl!”

 

“Oh, I can do more than tell. You can be next, you know. Stay here with me in this dream world, and I’ll show you everything… everything I did to her, everything that made her break. You can appreciate the beauty with me,” Tektite was back to smiling toothily, spreading her arms wide. Darkness swirled behind her, and her lantern gleamed, sinister and bright, and Steven felt sick at the sight of it.

 

“Break?” Steven’s blood ran cold. “You broke her?”

 

“She broke herself,” Tektite corrected, tutting with her tongue against her sharp teeth. “I only gave her a little _push_ … Well,” she laughed, immeasurably pleased by the chance to gloat, “Maybe not so _little_.”

 

Steven was a gentle soul. He took pride in that, took pleasure in the way that Pearl and his father and the others all praised his soft heart. That he’d inherited from his mother something so precious, so rare as boundless kindness, was worth celebrating. He was only a boy, small and weak and half human, but he strove to be like Rose Quartz in that respect. Steven was made of second and third chances, and a heartfelt belief in the good in everyone.

 

So the rage that filled him, made him see red, was like nothing he had ever felt. It surged up from his Gem, through every cell of his being, grew bigger than he was, bigger than his bubble, and burst out from his chest in a roar that sounded like Lion. The last of the walls came crashing down around them.

 

“How dare you!?” he shouted, tears streaming down his cheeks, and the ripple of his bubble expanding and popping bowled Tektite over. The pink was back again, overwhelming and brilliant, and burning in the air. “How dare you brag about hurting someone? How can you smile about that?! _How dare you hurt_ _my Pearl_?!”

 

Tektite scrambled to rise again, but wave after wave of magical energy assaulted her. She clutched her lantern, the last source of darkness left, save for the crumbling patch of mossy stone she stood on, and Steven saw the beginnings of cracks in the enemy herself—cobwebbed lace spreading up her arm like lightning.

 

He’d won.

 

Tektite crumbled like dust in the wind.


	9. Helpful Hint

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hope springs eternal with Steven around.

Amethyst’s retelling of her experience in the dream world didn’t give Garnet very much to go off of. There were several Gems with the ability to create alternate realities, and Garnet had never experienced any of their powers firsthand. Then again, neither had Ruby or Sapphire. The former was furious at her own lack of experience, while the latter fretted over bleak futures where Pearl never woke up, where they never figured out _how_ to wake her up. Garnet could feel their turmoil in her Gems and in her heart, but never left Pearl’s side, even after laying her down next to Steven, with Lion to prop them both up. She finally let her gauntlets disappear, cradling Pearl’s face in hand while Amethyst described the dungeon setting with astonishing accuracy. Pearl’s skin was cold and clammy, and Garnet could see the green resonance of the enemy’s magic in her Gem.

 

Something flickered through Garnet’s senses, a flurry of energy, and she looked down at Steven in time to see his Gem glow brilliantly. Lion chuffed into the boy’s hair, nudging his face with his muzzle, and Amethyst’s eyes turned toward the glow to see the green light flare and fade—and to their combined relief, Steven jolted upright.

 

“Pearl?!” Steven gasped, looking around wildly as his eyes adjusted to the mid-afternoon light. Amethyst hugged him tightly, squeezing so hard that it left the child winded.

 

“She’s here,” Garnet said quickly, reaching to tug the boy back down out of Amethyst’s death grip and mussing his hair affectionately. “Still asleep. Are you alright?”

 

“Amethyst? Garnet?” Steven shook his head, trying to garner his thoughts. It felt like his brain had been replaced with cotton. Pearl was next to him, sure enough, and a quick glance at her Gem—intact—put some of his worries to rest. “I’m… I’m okay. I fought someone?” he mumbled, “She was another Gem, but she was all black… It was like a bad dream, I…”

 

“Take a deep breath,” Garnet said, voice deceptively calm. With her visor in place, her teammates couldn’t see the tears of relief threatening to pool in her eyes. She blinked rapidly to dispel them, shaking her head. “We have some time. What matters is that you’re okay.”

 

“Yeah, you can tell us what you saw after you take a breather,” Amethyst agreed, “It takes a little bit to get that gross dungeon feeling to go away.”

 

“But—“ Steven protested, earning a heavy paw over most of his face for his efforts. He fell silent, breathing hard. Lion held him in place for several moments before licking the back of his head and dropping his paw, as if giving permission to carry on. Steven frowned. “She kept talking about the war, and a general-someone, and kept thinking I was mom… she said she broke Pearl, and I got so mad, I just kind of… broke out.”

 

Amethyst grinned, but it didn’t meet her eyes, and she offered a remarkably soft punch of approval. “That’s my Ste-man! You did it!”

 

“Pearl’s not broken,” Garnet said, voice hard and firm, even as the idea had her fingertips quaking. The Fusion sighed through her nose, pushing her visor up. “From your description, the enemy we’re up against is a powerful Gem from ancient times named Tektite. Back during the war, she was part of a team Homeworld sent to fight dirty against the resistance, ignoring the rules of combat to win at any cost.

 

“General Moldavite’s Specials were absolute terrors on the battlefield. They shattered countless Gems on our side, even soldiers on their team to lure victims in. They tortured Gems for information and mounted them on weapons, wore shards as jewelry. The Specials were the worst Homeworld had to offer,” Garnet’s voice grew progressively lower, almost a growl by the end of her speech.

 

The other two Crystal Gems stared, unsure of what to say, but Amethyst was the first to cut in.

 

“Wait, G—are you saying there’s been another Gem just… wandering around, _not_ turned into a monster, since way back then?” she asked, exchanging a wide-eyed look of concern with Steven.

 

“The Specials’re monsters to begin with,” Garnet said tersely, “But I don’t know how else to explain this. It’s got Tektite’s MO all over it.”

 

Steven was quiet for another few moments, turning a little where he lay to look up at Pearl’s pale face. They hadn’t seen any other Gems, but something nagged at his memory, something green and bright…

 

“The lantern!” Steven gasped, looking up at Garnet, who nodded for him to elaborate. “When… Tektite, when I saw her in the dream, she had a black lantern. It’s the one on the ceiling in the room we found Pearl in! She must…” he bit his lip, considering, then hastily; “She must be stuck in that lantern, like Lapis in the mirror. She wouldn’t let go of it in my dream.”

 

“Then let’s smash it, and Pearl’s bound to wake up! Right?” Amethyst asked hopefully, slamming her fist into the palm of her opposite hand. “Bam!”

 

“ _No_!”

 

Amethyst and Steven recoiled instinctively, and Garnet clenched her jaw so tightly shut that it ached. She hadn’t meant to shout. “No,” she said again, voice measured, several decibels lower. “If we eliminate Tektite now, there are too many potential futures where Pearl doesn’t wake up at all.”

 

“So what do we do?” Amethyst shot back, staring down at Pearl’s prone body for a moment before clenching her fists. Her knuckles went white from the strain almost immediately. “We can’t just wait forever, Garnet!”

 

“I’m trying to figure that out, Amethyst. There are immeasurable possibilities, and even knowing now that we’re dealing with an old enemy, I can’t narrow them down if we’re fighting.”

 

Steven said nothing, watching Pearl’s face, watching the way she barely breathed. It was like a spell from a fairytale, he thought, like something out of the stories his dad had turned into songs when he was little.

 

“A kiss,” he said abruptly, earning a quizzical look from Amethyst before he turned to Garnet, whose expression was unreadable. “Garnet, if you kiss her and give her your future vision, maybe that would wake her up!”


	10. Light in the Dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Garnet has to find a way to reach Pearl's subconscious.

As so many of Steven’s ideas were, it was an unorthodox one. Amethyst glanced to Garnet, unable to glean anything from her carefully guarded face, consumed no doubt by the futures she was combing through. Steven looked hopefully between them, then to Pearl.

 

“It has to work, right? If you can show her that she _will_ wake up, maybe Pearl can do the rest!”

 

“Does it even work that way?” Amethyst asked, frowning a little, though the mental image of Pearl waking up to a kiss from Garnet would have been hilarious under any other set of circumstances. The lavender Gem’s brows creased with worry when Garnet didn’t respond. “I mean, I’m fresh out of ideas, but we can’t just…”

 

“It might work,” Garnet said abruptly, adjusting her visor. She knelt, getting as close to her unconscious companion as her position would allow and smoothing Pearl’s damp bangs away from her Gem. Pearl didn’t stir, deep in her sleeplike state. “It’s better than not trying.”

 

She leaned down slowly, brushing her lips over the smooth curve of Pearl’s Gem—only to be met with a hot zap of magic and a burning green flash that tried to consume her vision. She jerked back, a hand to her mouth. The sting lingered, quickly turning into an aching tingle.

 

“Are you okay?” Steven asked frantically. Amethyst looked pale, but Steven had clearly beaten her to the punch.

 

Garnet nodded, tasting spice and fire on her lips and tongue—the strange incense from the room with the lantern, she realized. “I’ll be fine,” she muttered, “Tektite’s influence is still there… I’ll have to get in another way.”

 

“What other way?” Amethyst cut in, raking her fingers through her hair as her nerves threatened to get the better of her. She was pacing, Garnet realized, not having paid much heed to Amethyst’s constant movement. “Is _that_ even possible!?”

 

“Calm down, Amethyst,” Garnet said slowly, barely nodding toward Steven. The boy looked sick with worry. “Sapphire has an idea for how we might be able to reach her subconscious, I’ve just… never done it. We’re trying to decide if it’s possible.”

 

“You can do it, Garnet!” Steven chimed in, “I believe in you!”

 

That was more than Garnet had currently, at least. Telepathy wasn’t one of her honed gifts; Steven had a knack for it, and Sapphire insisted that it was possible. Ruby, however, had no such gifts of her own; she was a common soldier. Even her fire-based powers were an anomaly. Rubies were made for punching, for fusion. Sapphires were made for seeing the future and sharing it.

 

Which left Garnet somewhere in the middle.

 

The Fusion stared down at her hands, at her paired Gems, then sighed. “I’ll do what I can,” she said, ignoring the very many potential futures where this, too, went disastrously wrong. Steeling herself, Garnet took Pearl’s face in her hands, Gems alight, and waited for Pearl’s to follow suit. The glow was dim, but Garnet was still immensely relieved to see the white light flickering behind the green miasma that prevented her initial plan.

 

Pearl had always been eager to fuse, and they’d never needed to try very hard to synchronize. Garnet hummed to her, a song intimately familiar to the prone dancer, and watched as her Gem glowed a little brighter.

 

Their experience at the hub was far from forgotten, but then, Garnet didn’t see any other alternatives. They couldn’t fuse like this, but she trusted Pearl. The sting of betrayal weeks prior was still there, still fresh and raw, but _this_ …

 

She stroked Pearl’s face, wondered if she were imagining Pearl leaning into her touch, and sang instead, a mournful chorus, and Pearl’s Gem responded.

 

Losing Pearl wasn’t worth never opening her heart again.

 

So Garnet shared her light, put all her trust in the possibility of finding the future where they both woke up. Garnet glowed a brilliant white, and Pearl was consumed by it—their forms stayed that way, at a crossroads between light and the solid, physical bodies they so often took.

 

Fusion was impossible without explicit consent, and Pearl was in no condition to give it. Garnet couldn’t help the nagging feeling of guilt at intruding like this, trying to enter Pearl’s mind while she slept, but knew no other way to get around Tektite’s magic. Ruby felt justified, and Sapphire worried about forgiveness, while Garnet tried to focus on finding the path that lead into Pearl’s mind.

 

There were three doors; two side-by-side, red and blue, with a shared threshold, and these were to her left. She recognized them, knew without having seen either that these led to the inner sanctums of Ruby and Sapphire’s deepest subconscious minds. They were one, in mind and—usually—in body, and Garnet turned her attention instead to the white door to her left, larger and narrower. Plain, cream colored, with a simple door handle. Incredibly modern; Garnet would have laughed at how much the humans had affected Pearl in recent centuries if the situation allowed it.

 

Instead, she paused, laid her hand on the handle. It was warm, with the kind of softness Pearl’s hands had, and turned easily for her. Steeling herself, Garnet pushed it open and stepped into the dark.

 

The door swung shut behind her, leaving her in a sea of darkness.

 

She blinked against the darkness, but it was like staring into nothing she’d ever encountered. There was no room for light here, and she raised her hand, summoning some—only to realize with a yell that was not in her voice that the red glow that left her Gem wasn’t her own, but Ruby’s.

 

“Sapphire?” she asked immediately, casting red light around desperately, only to catch sight of her other half less than a pace away. Sapphire reached for her opposite hand, and they intertwined their fingers instinctively.

 

“I’m here,” Sapphire said in a rush, drawing Ruby’s hand up to kiss her knuckles reassuringly. “We made it.”

 

“Why aren’t we fused?” Ruby asked, voice strained. The other Gem’s contact helped, but the bubbling feeling of panic in her chest was persistent. “Where’s Garnet? How are we supposed to find Pearl?”

 

“Ssh,” Sapphire said, “Garnet’s still here. Between us. But…” her voice dropped, perplexed. “I can’t see much. There are too many possibilities, and I have nothing to narrow them down with. I don’t know where Pearl is in here, but we’ll find her. Just… don’t let go of me, all right?”

 

“Why would I?” Ruby asked, clutching Sapphire’s smaller hand tighter still. “I’m not losing you!”

 

The cyclops smiled reassuringly, summoning light from her own Gem. “We’ll be fine, then. Come on, let’s find Pearl.”


	11. In the Darkness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A glimmer of hope is all you need.

Without anything but their own habitual breathing to measure time by, neither Sapphire nor Ruby could tell how much time passed as they navigated through the darkness. Sometimes, one would find a wall, where the light from her Gem simply stopped, and it needed to be navigated around. For the most part, they were silent.

 

This was nothing like the space that existed between them during fusion. This was nothing like being part of _Sardonyx_ , either, and neither Gem wanted to admit to how much that scared them. Pearl was always bright and welcoming when they fused—any combination thereof—and the hollow, empty darkness was anything but. Ruby held Sapphire’s gloved hand tight in hers, fingers laced, and lead the way, preferring to be the one to bump into something if either of them had to do it. Sapphire suggested different paths occasionally, tugging Ruby’s hand to change direction, and then they were back to wandering through nothing.

 

It felt like hours, but in the waking world may well have been minutes. Sapphire explained to Ruby that time passed differently in the subconscious, in dreams, and Ruby made it abundantly clear that she didn’t like it one bit.

 

So they tried to break the silence, despite both being on guard, ready for… something. A change. A break in the darkness. Sapphire was the first to bring up Garnet’s feelings for Pearl—a topic long unspoken between them—and Ruby didn’t know what to say.

 

“I’m still mad,” Ruby admitted finally, “But I know… I mean, you already know. We can’t live without her.”

 

“We _could_ ,” Sapphire corrected her gently, “But I don’t believe Garnet would want to keep on. Like if I lost you.”

 

“You’re _never_ losing me,” Ruby insisted, “Ever! But…” her voice dropped, gaze suddenly quite transfixed on her boots. “Can we even find Pearl in this…? What if Tektite _did_ break her?”

 

The blue Gem frowned, shaking her head. “I’m not going to give those futures a chance.”

 

Silence again, and Ruby sighed heavily. “This isn’t getting us anywhere,” she grumbled, tipping her head back to stare at the ceiling—

 

Which wasn’t quite as dark as the area they’d been navigating. There was a faint glimmer in the distance, a white haze far above their heads.

 

“Sapphire!” Ruby said, pointing upward, “I think I… found her?”

 

Sapphire’s eyesight didn’t quite match Ruby’s, but she would take her other half’s word at it. She squinted against the darkness, against visions that didn’t lead anywhere. “Hold on to me,” Sapphire said, reaching for Ruby’s other hand before lifting off of the ground. Ruby clutched her wrists for dear life, and they soared upward.

 

Sure enough, the glow seemed to come from an ovular platform high above the ground. There was a figure lying prone, curled into a loose ball, face down in a puddle of water. Pink hair cascaded all around her—spilled over the edge of the platform, and a long cream dress, covered in beads and gems did the same. Barefoot except for the first of many bangles, there was no doubt in either of their minds that this—somehow—was what Pearl had been reduced to.

 

Sapphire and Ruby landed together, linking their hands again gently. “Pearl!” both cried in unison, and Garnet’s voice was there, too, mixed in between her components’. They rushed to her side, kneeling. “Pearl, wake up!”

 

To their combined relief, the other Gem stirred, turned her head very slightly. Hair clung to her face and forehead, but her Gem was visible, and Ruby and Sapphire shared a sigh of relief. It looked normal. For all that wasn’t right about this, about Pearl looking nothing like herself, her Gem was intact and whole.

 

That was the first thing that mattered.

 

“Pearl, it’s us!” Ruby said, privately horrified to see the way her arms shook as she tried to push herself up out of the shallow water. Pearl’s impossibly long hair covered most of her torso and arms, but Ruby could see chips of other Gems, familiar colors and cuts sewn into her transparent dress and dangling from a diadem connected to her Gem. Her stomach lurched. Sapphire covered her mouth with her hand to stifle a gasp of horror.

 

_What had Tektite done_?

 

Pale eyes turned toward them, puffy from crying, and Sapphire’s first thought was that they were standing in a pool of tears. Pearl stared blankly, and sure enough, her eyes welled up again. “You… you’re…”

 

“Don’t cry,” Sapphire shushed her, laying a gloved hand on Pearl’s shoulder. The other Gem recoiled as if burned, curling in on herself, murmuring under her breath indistinguishably.

 

And that was when Sapphire saw the bracelets.

 

She gasped, turning to tug at Ruby’s hand and nodding toward Pearl’s wrists—toward the gold bands with shattered Gems inlaid, blue and red with the same corresponding cuts to hers and Ruby’s, the same placement. There were other shards as well, purples and pinks, but the centerpieces…

 

“…You died, you did! I _know_ … She gave me…” Pearl sobbed brokenly, pressing her fists to her eyes against her tears. The liquid beneath them swirled, overflowing and spilling over the sides as she began to cry. “This isn’t real… Why…”

 

“Tektite _lied_ to you!” Ruby exclaimed, “Pearl, we’re not—we’re alive! We came to get you!”

 

Pearl turned sharply, eyes wide and hollow; she’d been so profoundly defeated, and after so long in the dark, in Tektite’s illusions, it was hard to hope. “But you’re broken,” she choked out, looking between her wrists, then to her best friends, long lost to ages that bled together in her once-perfect memory. “If not you, then…”

 

“It was a dream, Pearl,” Sapphire said gently, reaching for her, palm up. “I can show you. _We_ can show you. You just have to let us back in.”

 

“How…?” Pearl whispered, but she took her smaller hand with fingers that shook and trembled. Her tears continued unabated, pouring down her cheeks in rivers.

 

“Just trust us,” Ruby said, reaching for her other hand. Pearl took it, confused. They felt real enough, but so had everything else.

 

“We’ll show you,” Sapphire said warmly, looking to Ruby and carefully releasing her hand, turning her palm upward to show Pearl her Gem. Ruby did the same, and their stones glowed brightly. Pearl stared, mouth agape, then looked to her bracelets, then back to the familiar faces of her longest-living allies. Sure enough, they were as real as she was, and that meant that both Ruby and Sapphire were… and that _Garnet_ was…

 

A sickening crack resounded through the darkness, and the trio jumped slightly, Ruby and Sapphire’s hands finding each other again. Each looked around wildly, and the sound repeated itself, sick and sharp in the silence. Five eyes turned toward the source at once; it was the bracelets. The false stones cracked further and shattered to dust, and with them went the beads and stones that littered Pearl’s gown and diadem.

 

The nightmare was over.


	12. Reunion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The answer is love, without question.

“What’s happening?” Ruby asked sharply, holding on desperately to both Pearl and Sapphire’s hands, unwilling to risk letting go.

 

“Truth melts magic,” Sapphire explained, “Tektite’s influence must be fading now!”

 

The pool beneath them glowed, brilliant and blinding, and Sapphire leaned in close to Pearl, unwilling to release her hand, instead reaching up to her face with their fingers still intertwined. “Pearl, we’re in your mind—in the space between Fusion and reality—and this world belongs to you. You decide what happens next. We came to make sure you choose to come back to us.”

 

“I—“ Pearl started, shaking her head, shrinking back, “I don’t know—What about Garnet?” She blurt out, blinking against a resurgence of tears. “I want to see everyone again, I want to see _Garnet_ again, but I—“

 

“You can see Garnet _now_ ,” Sapphire cut her off, casting her gaze toward Ruby, who nodded. “If you’ll let the two of us fuse, will it set your worries to rest, Pearl?”

 

“She wants to see you too,” Ruby added, catching the trepidation in Pearl’s face. That brought a glimmer of the Gem they knew to the surface; haunted eyes regained focus, even for a moment, and Pearl nodded. Ruby released her hand gingerly, turning to Sapphire, who did the same.

 

Their fusion dance had always been simple, but Pearl rarely got the chance to witness it—but seeing the easy four step maneuver before Ruby lifted Sapphire into the air in a spin reaffirmed that this had to be real. No matter what she’d experienced, no matter what she’d seen in the centuries that had passed since her capture, her two friends were the same.

 

They glowed, replaced in an instant by Garnet’s familiar form, and Pearl stared in awe at the Fusion as memories of centuries long forgotten came flooding back. She knew this body; Garnet had taken years to become perfectly blended, a smooth combination of her component Gems, and though this form was relatively new, Pearl knew without a doubt that this was the most recent one she remembered.

 

“ _Garnet_!” Pearl cried, pushing herself up on unsteady legs; she tripped on her too-long hair and gown, falling into waiting arms that easily wrapped around her narrow back, the familiar feeling of Ruby and Sapphire’s Gems in their Fusion’s palms bringing on a new wave of tears. The slighter Gem clutched at her tightly, pressing her face into her best friend’s chest plate with a ragged sob, and Garnet rubbed circles between her bared shoulders soothingly. “Oh, Garnet…!”

 

“I’m here,” Garnet whispered, relieved to be back, doubly relieved to see that other platforms were coming to light in the relative darkness in Pearl’s subconscious. They glowed, came to life, and poured bright blue water in soft cascades down into the chasm Ruby and Sapphire had been navigating earlier. The Fusion shushed her, but let her cry. “You know I’ll always come for you.”

 

“I thought you were _dead_ ,” Pearl sobbed, “Tektite… she showed me so many things, I couldn’t… Garnet, I don’t know anything anymore, I thought… I thought we were still at war, I thought you were captured, and then the bracelets with your Gems, and I—“ she gasped, gripping Garnet tightly enough to force air out of her lungs. “ _Steven_! Garnet, is Steven safe? What about Amethyst? She didn’t capture them, did she?”

 

The grunt of air that left Garnet’s lips wasn’t voluntary, and she had to pry Pearl’s too-thin arms away from her midsection to regain her breath. She managed a smile, smothering the rage that wanted to erupt at the news, knowing full well that Pearl had gone through more than enough to warrant the stream of questions. Worse still, she could imagine the possibilities; the horrors Tektite must have subjected her to to reduce her to this. Still, Garnet shushed her quietly, sweeping a thumb across each cheek to wipe her tears. “They’re fine. They’re waiting for you to wake up,” she said gently, leaning in close to brush her lips against Pearl’s Gem, giving her a quick glimpse into the waking world—and this time, nothing stopped her from passing the vision along.

 

Pearl gasped at the feeling, long unaccustomed to sharing Garnet’s future sight. Even Sardonyx couldn’t really see the future; that skill hadn’t transferred over, outside of card tricks and slight of hand. But the sight of Steven and Amethyst, even _Lion_ waiting for her, made her heart soar.

 

“I want to wake up,” Pearl affirmed, smiling through her tears. “I want to. Do I…” she faltered, “Do I have to do anything? You’ll wake up too, won’t you? I can’t lose you, Garnet, I _can’t_.”

 

Garnet managed a lopsided grin at that, at Pearl’s ever-persistent worry for her and the others. Her heart swelled with relief that some things really didn’t change, that Pearl was still _her_ Pearl after the horrors she’d been subjected to. She smoothed Pearl’s long hair over her shoulder. “Either we’ll wake up separately, or as Sardonyx,” she said, “Whichever _you_ prefer.”

 

The weight of the offer was not lost on Pearl, despite her damaged memory.

 

“Together,” Pearl said finally, uncertain, but with growing confidence. She reached up, touching Garnet’s cheek hesitantly, and when Garnet turned to press her lips into her palm in what must have been a deliberate kiss, Pearl felt her heart flutter. “I want us both to wake up, together… not as Sardonyx. I just want to be with you and the others again.”

 

The pale Gem paused, then leaned up on unsteady legs, and Garnet met her half way to keep her from losing her footing as the water beneath their feet swirled and cascaded over the platform.

 

“Garnet I just—I want to tell you—“ Pearl started, long fingers tracing down to skirt her lips, over the plump swell of petal-soft skin, and Garnet smiled against her fingertips.

 

“I know. I do too,” she said quietly, leaning in to brush her lips against the corner of Pearl’s mouth. The other Gem gasped, and Garnet waited for her to finish the kiss, patient and confident that Pearl would turn her head.

 

Her patience was rewarded after only a few seconds, and Pearl kissed her soundly, wrapping her arms around Garnet’s shoulders and clinging for dear life.

 

The kiss was something simple, chaste, but with their souls barred to one another inside Pearl’s mind, it was electrifying—and like a fairytale, it was the final piece of the puzzle.

 

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

They woke up moments later, lips still locked, to the shocked gasps of Steven and Amethyst; neither of which were expecting to see their teammates reform together in a perfect lip lock. Pearl flushed, pulling back slightly, and Garnet let her.

 

Neither Steven nor Amethyst knew what to say. But then, neither did they expect Pearl to look so… different.

 

Garnet carefully untangled herself from the pink-haired Gem, whose hair went well past her bare feet now, splayed all over the ground beneath them. The cream dress was shorter, at least, gathered in pleats beneath the meager bust. The bangles were gone, leaving no trace of Tektite’s cruel treatment.

 

Steven was the first to recover, diving to wrap Pearl in a tight hug. “Pearl!” he cried, pressing his face into her long hair and squeezing her shoulders, hiding tears of relief.

 

“Steven?” Pearl asked, raising an arm to hug him back, “You’re all right?”

 

“Uh, P, the one we’re worried about here is _you_!” Amethyst said sharply, giving her an appraising look. Pearl’s cheeks flushed, and she looked away, giving the purple Gem ample opportunity to join in the hug, crushing her midsection below Steven’s arms. “Good to have you back, Pierogi. Never scare us like that again.”

 

“Ah—“ Pearl started, set to apologize, and found herself face-to-face with Lion instead. The big pink cat stared at her, eyes eerie and glowing, and Pearl’s voice left her completely. Then, without warning, Lion’s great maw opened up and he licked her across the face. “ _Augh_! Disgusting!”

 

“There’s my girl,” Garnet chuckled, gently pushing Lion’s muzzle away to let Steven wipe Pearl’s face clean with his shirt. “Glad to have you back.”


	13. Epilogue: Unfinished Business

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Garnet goes back to finish the job.

It was two days later when Garnet returned to the subterranean temple alone. She had been reluctant to leave the lantern behind, but Steven and Amethyst had insisted on going back to the Temple, and Garnet was the only one in a position to carry Pearl. Concern for her best friend won out; Tektite wasn’t going anywhere, if she were even still alive, and the pink-haired Gem had a long recovery ahead of her.

 

In the span of two days Pearl’s condition had improved, but only marginally.

 

Pearl slept, which was new and confusing, and undoubtedly a side effect of Tektite’s magic. Worse yet, she spoke in her sleep, sometimes projecting images of her nightmares—but only sometimes, and always tinted green. Her form was unstable, often reverting to the one she had taken when they reformed together; with long hair and an impractical dress. She could shift her clothing back, and often did, but it was plainly a strain on the alabaster Gem. Amethyst braided her hair for her, pinned it up out of the way, and the household tried to adjust to how _different_ Pearl was now. Pearl was withdrawn, jumpy, and worst of all, _quiet_.

 

Though Tektite should have been gone, something still lingered, and that something was deeply wrong. Although Garnet assured both Pearl and the others that everything was fine, and would be in short order, she had her doubts. Steven may have defeated the piece of Tektite that had found its way into his Gem, but the lantern still existed, and that meant the enemy could still be out there, pulling unseen strings. She berated herself silently for not considering such a thing sooner, but then, there had been other things to worry about.

 

The source was the best place to look for answers, and Garnet was ready to rip the temple apart to find it.

 

It was easy enough to find the path back to Tektite’s chamber. Garnet had laid waste to the corridors on the way out, and no more monster spiders seemed brave enough to even approach the area. Still, gauntlets at the ready, Garnet navigated her way down into the depths of the temple, ignoring the darkness this time. She didn’t need to see, not yet.

 

A faint green glow greeted her at the end of the long corridor, and Garnet steeled herself. There was no chance she would let her guard down here, when it had proven so disastrous for the rest of her team.

 

“Tektite!” Garnet shouted, listening to her voice reverberate off of the remaining walls of the dead-end chamber. “Show yourself!”

 

Laughter, faint and menacing, blew through the room like a breeze, and Garnet set her gaze on the cast iron lantern rooted to the ceiling. Smoke slithered down, and Garnet could smell the heady incense on the air. She stopped breathing, shifted away that part of her humanlike anatomy. There was no sense risking anything at this point.

 

The ghost that flickered before her was small, half-formed in the fog of the room.

 

“You must be the ‘Garnet’ my poppet talked about,” Tektite said smoothly, scanning her larger opponent. Not that they could fight. Not like this. “You’ll get no help from me. Her damage is out of my hands.”

 

Garnet had suspected as much. She clenched her gauntlets tight, fighting the urge to lash out. The Fusion growled under her breath, standing tall. “I came to offer you a deal,” she said tersely, “But if you won’t help Pearl—“

 

“Not _won’t_ , dear,” Tektite smiled, flickering a little in the dim light of the room. “I _can’t_. She pushed me out. Very impressive, really. I thought I had her completely.” She paused in her gloating, curiosity getting the better of her, “But go on about your deal. I’m open to hear it. Maybe I can do… something.”

 

The Fusion stared impassively at the much smaller Gem for long moments, trying to keep herself in check. _Stick to the plan_ , she told herself, knowing that there were a handful of possibilities to explore from here.

 

“You’re trapped in that lantern,” Garnet said icily, face impassive. “You take back the magic you left in Pearl, and I’ll get you out.”

 

Green eyes widened at the prospect. She’d tried reforming several times since meeting the Steven, since he’d broken the part of her that she had left in the Rose Quartz Gem, to no effect. The best she had been able to muster was astral projection within this room, a small fraction of the power she should have possessed.

 

“And?” Tektite asked eagerly, running her tongue along her fangs. “The alternative? It sounds traitorous on your part, helping a Special like me. All for a Pearl.”

 

“The alternative…” Garnet said, voice a low rumble, “Is that I grind your Gem to dust with my gauntlets, and you never hurt anyone I love again.”

 

“Love?” the dark Gem laughed, “This is for _love_? Your side is pathetic.” She paused, though, sizing Garnet up. She didn’t stand a chance and knew it, and she spread her hands in a last appeal. “I’ll take your deal. Release me and bring me to my puppet… I’ll cut her strings, and we go our separate ways. Fair, isn’t it? You get your precious Pearl back, and I’ll just… vanish.”

 

 _She’s lying_ , Sapphire’s voice cut through Garnet’s thoughts.

 

That came as no surprise, and Garnet closed her eyes, maneuvering through those futures. Tektite may well have had the power to do something—but the likelihood of her doing anything other than hurting Pearl if she brought the lantern home was one in a million.

 

Tektite’s smile confirmed her suspicions one hundred percent.

 

Garnet nodded, launching off of the floor to rip the lantern from the ceiling without another word.

 

“Hey!” Tektite protested, alarmed. “Be careful with that! It’s more precious than all of you worthless Crystal Gems combined!”

 

“Is it?” Garnet asked coolly, turning to the other Gem, holding the lantern in hand. “I don’t agree.” And with that, she tore into it, breaking the metal apart as if it were paper. Tektite screamed in protest, and Garnet ignored her, shaking green coals out of the base of the lantern.

 

The center contained a rough Gem, small and black. Garnet’s gaze lingered on it, then glanced to the apparition before her, who flickered like a candle’s flame.

 

“You’re not…” Tektite started.

 

“You told the truth when you said it was out of your hands,” Garnet said, smothering her fury for the moment. “But unfortunately for you… that means you’re not worth anything to me alive.”

 

“Wait!” Tektite tried, “You need me, you—“

 

“I need something you can’t give!” Garnet shot back, gauntlets clenching around the mounted Gem in her hands. “I need _Pearl_ ; I need my teammates, and _you_ tried to take them from me!” her voice rose in octave, shaking the walls with its force. “I need the Gems you shattered five thousand years ago for _sport_ , and you _can’t return that_!”

 

“Ro—Rose Quartz won’t want this,” the Special was desperate now, feeling pressure on her Gem from all sides. She clutched its placement at her breastbone, panting despite not needing to breathe. “Take me to her, your leader, you’ll see—“

 

“I’m the leader now,” Garnet said, but her tirade did not fall on deaf ears. Furious though she was, Rose’s memory burned at her heart.

 

_What would Rose Quartz do?_

Rose and her infinite patience, her ability to see good where there was none—Garnet wasn’t like Rose. Garnet had never _been_ like her, despite over a decade of trying to fill her footsteps.

 

For a moment, her heart wavered. She formed a bubble, encasing the Gem, and Tektite’s transparent form flickered, a look of relief spreading across the enemy’s face.

 

And then Garnet slammed her gauntlets together, obliterating all trace of both bubble and Gem.

 

Tektite didn’t even have time to scream.

 

“I’m not Rose Quartz. And I protect my family _my_ way.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy crap guys, I can't believe I finished this. Thank you for sticking with me through this whole thing! 
> 
> The story doesn't end here, but this is the last chapter of Dream a Dream. I'm not sure when I'll start getting Walk This World up, but I promise it's in the works!


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